Rationale

Cloud forest plant assemblages are among the richness worldwide. Hummingbird visited plants make up a large percentage of the plant assemblage. Previous work has shown that hummingbirds feed on plants that match corollas based on bill length. This suggests that plants with similiar corolla morphologies compete for pollination resources. To minimize competition between species, as well as decrease amount of pollen loss due to heterospecific transfer, there should be selection for minimal overlap in flowering timing. While this has been evaluated within a single genus (Stiles 1975) there has been little work in combining relatedness, environment and morphol- ogy in a single framework.

Approach

We collected flower abundance for hummingbird visited flowers along a 1300m elevation gradient in northern ecuador.

DrawingDrawing Drawing

We measured three flower morphology traits for each species: corolla width, corolla length and height of plant from ground.

Drawing

Data

##            Iplant_Double Total_Flowers     Date
## 1       Salvia quitensis             4 10/09/13
## 2       Salvia quitensis            12 10/09/13
## 3 Gasteranthus quitensis             1 10/09/13
## 4   Columnea mastersonii             4 10/09/13
## 5   Columnea mastersonii             2 10/09/13
## 6 Gasteranthus quitensis             3 10/09/13

Flower abundance of top ten species

abun_table<-table(dat$Iplant_Double)
ta<-as.data.frame(sort(abun_table,decreasing = TRUE)[1:10])
colnames(ta)<-c("Abundance")
print(xtable(ta),type="html",include.rownames=TRUE)
Abundance
Gasteranthus quitensis 1011
Besleria solanoides 913
Palicourea demissa 913
Palicourea acetosoides 424
Columnea strigosa 335
Meriania tomentosa 330
Psammisia ulbrichiana 328
Palicourea lineata 288
Heppiella ulmifolia 285
Columnea medicinalis 279

Flower abundance changes throughout the year and along the elevation gradient.